Muffins and related foods such as pancakes, cakes, brownies and the like are typically made from scratch or from a dry mix, where consumers make a batter by adding liquids to dry ingredients and then bake the batter soon after mixing. While these methods produce high quality baked goods, preparation of the batters can be time consuming and the batter should be used by the consumer immediately both to provide for optimum leavening action and because the batters are not microbiologically stable under refrigerated storage conditions. Some of these problems have been overcome by preparing muffins from frozen muffin batters wherein the consumer thaws and then bakes the batter. These batters have a slightly lower A.sub.w (water activity) than batters mixed from scratch or dry mixes, and can be stored for about 48 hours under refrigerated conditions while maintaining leavening and microbial stability properties. However, the lower water activity can result in a drier muffin than muffins prepared from a dry mix, and the refrigerated storage life of the thawed batter is short. If the entire batch is not used relatively quickly, there is the risk that the unused portion of the batter will spoil and be wasted.
There are some premixed refrigerated doughs available on the market, such as bread dough, cookie dough and the like. These doughs typically need to be hermetically sealed and/or stored under pressure in order to have good shelf stability properties in the refrigerator, which means that after opening they cannot be stored for long periods of time. These products also tend to have relatively low A.sub.w values, meaning that the resulting baked goods tend to be somewhat dry.
Attempts have been made to provide batters that can be stored in the refrigerator for long periods of time prior to baking. Joslin, U.S. Pat. No. 2,810,650 describes batters that contain a heat activated leavening system comprising dicalcium phosphate dihydrate. These batters showed good leavening properties after 45 days refrigerated storage in hermetically sealed cans. Cochran, U.S. Pat. No. 2,982,662 describes batters that can be stored for up to 17 days in sealed cans and then baked into satisfactory products.
Kahn et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,154,863, describe intermediate moisture foods including doughs that are pourable or spoonable at freezer temperatures. These doughs can be stored at freezer temperatures and then baked.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,353,932, Bone describes intermediate moisture pancake batters that are microbiologically stable and pourable at room temperatures. These batters have a water content of about 30 to 40% and a sugar content of about 14 to 20%.
There is a need for a batter that can be stored by the consumer in the refrigerator, that is spoonable and resembles a batter prepared from scratch or a dry mix, that can be stored for a long period of time in the refrigerator without the need for hermetic or pressurized sealing, and that produces a baked product comparable to those obtained when the batter is made from scratch or a dry mix.